Mat finally looked up from his maps. He was not sure he would ever grow accustomed to these gateways. He stood in their command building, the one Tuon had erected in the cleft at the foot of Dashar Knob, and there was a gateway in his wall. Outside it Galad sat his horse wearing the gold and white of the Children of the Light. He was still positioned near the ruins, where a Trolloc army was trying to push its way across the Mora.
Galad Damodred was a man who could have used a few stiff drinks in him. He could have been a statue, with that pretty face and unchanging expression. No, statues had more life.
“You’ll do as you’re told,” Mat said, looking back to his maps. “You are to hold the river up there and do as Tam tells you. I don’t care if you think your place isn’t important enough.”
“Very well,” Galad said, voice as cold as a corpse in the snow. He turned his horse away, and Mika the damane closed the gateway.
“It’s a bloodbath out there, Mat,” Elayne said. Light, her voice was colder than Galad’s!
“You all put me in charge. Let me do my job.”
“We made you commander of the armies,” Elayne said. “You are not in charge.”
Trust an Aes Sedai to argue over every little word. It.… He looked up, frowning. Min had just said something softly to Tuon. “What is it?” he asked.
“I saw his body alone, on a field,” Min said, “as if dead.”
“Matrim,” Tuon said. “I am… concerned.”
“For once we agree,” Elayne said from her throne on the other side of the room. “Mat, their general is outmatching you.”
“It’s not so bloody simple,” Mat said, fingers on the maps. “It’s never that bloody simple.”
The man leading the Shadow was good. Very good. It’s Demandred, Mat thought. I’m fighting one of the bloody Forsaken.
Together, Mat and Demandred were composing a grand painting. Each responded to the other’s moves with subtle care. Mat was trying to use just a little too much red in one of his paints. He wanted to paint the wrong picture, but still a reasonable one.
It was hard. He had to be capable enough to keep Demandred back, but weak enough to invite aggression. A feint, ever so subtle. It was dangerous, possibly disastrous. He had to walk on a razor edge. There was no way to avoid cutting his feet. The question was not whether he would be bloodied, but whether he would reach the other side or not.
“Move in the Ogier,” Mat said softly, fingers on the map. “I want them to reinforce the men at the ford.” The Aiel fought there, guarding the way as the White Tower’s men and the members of the Band of the Red Hand retreated off the Heights per his order.
The command was relayed to the Ogier. Stay safe, Loial, Mat thought, making a notation on the map where he had sent the Ogier. “Alert Lan, he’s still on the western side of the Heights. I want him to swing around the back of the Heights, now that most of the Shadow’s forces are on top, and back toward the Mora, behind the other Trolloc army trying to cross near the ruins. He’s not to engage them; just stay out of sight and hold his position.”
The messengers ran to do his bidding, and he made another notation. One of the so’jhin brought him some kaf, the cute one with the freckles. He was too absorbed by the battle to smile at her.
Sipping his kaf, Mat had the damane make him a gateway on the table-top so he could see the battlefield itself. He leaned out over it, but kept one hand on the rim of the table. Only a bloody fool would let someone shove him through a hole two hundred feet over the ground.
He set down his kaf on a side table and took out his looking glass. The Trollocs were moving down the Heights toward the bogs. Yes, Demandred was good. The hulking beasts he had sent toward the bogs were slow but thick and powerful, like a rockslide. Also, a group of mounted Sharans were about to ride down from the Heights. Light cavalry. They would hit Mat’s troops holding Hawal Ford, and keep them from attacking the Trolloc left flank.
A battle was a swordfight on a grand scale. For every move, there was a counter—often three or four. You responded by moving a squad here, a squad there, trying to counter what your enemy did while putting pressure on him in places where he was thin. Back and forth, back and forth. Mat was outnumbered, but he could use that.
“Relay the following to Talmanes,” Mat said, eye still to the looking glass. “ ‘Remember when you bet me I couldn’t throw a coin into a cup from across the entire inn?’ ”
“Yes, Great One,” the Seanchan messenger said.
Mat had responded to the bet by saying he would try it once he was drunker—otherwise, there would have been no sport to it. Then Mat had pretended to get drunk, and provoked Talmanes to up the bet from silver to gold.
Talmanes had figured him out and insisted he really drink. I still owe him a few marks for that, don’t I? Mat thought absently.
He pointed the looking glass to the northern part of the Heights. A group of Sharan heavy cavalry had gathered to move down the slope; he could make out their long, steel-tipped lances.
They were preparing to charge down the slope to intercept Lan’s men as they swung around the northern side of the Heights. But the order hadn’t even reached Lan yet.
It confirmed Mat’s suspicions: Demandred not only had spies in the camp, he had one in or near the command tent. Someone who could send messages as soon as Mat gave orders. That probably meant a channeler, here, inside the tent and masking their ability.
Bloody ashes, Mat thought. As if this weren’t tough enough.
The messenger returned from Talmanes. “Great One,” he said, prostrating himself nose to the floor, “your man says that his forces are completely ruined. He wishes to follow your order, but says that the dragons will not be available for the rest of this day. It will take weeks to repair them. They are… I’m sorry, Great One, but these were his exact words. They are worse off than a barmaid in Sabinel. I do not know what it means.”